Rising costs and player safety are among the many issues facing the world’s largest amateur hockey organization.

On Dec. 29, it will be 100 years since Frank Smith, a 17-year-old goaltender, dreamed of playing against more teams and ultimately founded the Toronto Hockey League.

Smith, who was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1962, would be astounded if he knew how that league has grown.

What started with 99 players on five teams has grown to more than 40,000 participants in what’s now called the Greater Toronto Hockey League.

“Today, we have over 28,000 players in 30 house leagues and Mississauga Hockey League, plus 51 competitive clubs with over 540 teams,” says Scott Oakman, executive director of the GTHL, now a $9 million-a-year operation.

The league will schedule more than 12,000 games next season and will certify 1,200 on-ice officials.

Many graduates have earned scholarships, while approximately 275 players, builders or officials have played in the NHL or the old World Hockey Association. Several have been inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame.

With this growth comes challenges:

Costs: The league contracts and pays for all its own game ice. In spite of aging facilities, neither the province nor the city wants to build new arenas. However, private enterprise saw opportunities and by the mid-90s privately owned rinks were springing up.

“The cost of the game is directly related to the cost of the ice,” Oakman said.

Some arenas charge up to $350 an hour for prime-time practice ice.

In the late 1980s, GTHL president John Gardner wanted to help offset costs and was determined to build a multi-purpose, four-pad International Ice Centre. It was killed by politics beyond the league’s control.

Marketing: Back in the 1980s, Gardner had a radio show and convinced two rising producers, Keith Pelley and Scott Moore, to co-host a Saturday night cable television show that became very successful. That, too, is gone.

“I still want a television show to highlight our youth in hockey at all levels of play,” said Gardner. “They deserve the recognition.”

Oakman says the league has recently experienced an “explosion of marketing” in a different way.

“We have sponsors now,” he said, noting that private enterprise is finally seeing the value of supporting minor hockey. Both Canadian Tire and Scotiabank came on board last year.

Residency: Over the years, residency requirements and boundaries have angered parents who believe their children should be able to play anywhere they want. Some people sued the league and legal costs rose.

“Residential regulations haven’t changed in 30 years,” Gardner said. “We would like no residential regulations for 15- to 17-year-olds as a pilot project. We want to lead and not follow.”

Safety: By 2003, the GTHL became the first hockey body in Canada to insist that any player who suffered a concussion must have a physician’s permission before returning to play.

Bodychecking has been a contentious issue for decades. In 1985, the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association, predecessor of Hockey Canada, declared no bodychecking for players aged 12 and under.

Within a few seasons, pilot projects that permitted bodychecking for 9- and 10-year-olds in the Ontario Hockey Federation, Ottawa District and Saskatchewan yielded inconclusive results with regard to player safety.

A Hockey Canada press release in late August announced that the body is studying how to make more leagues with no bodychecking available, how to be more accommodating toward private programs and ways to allow freer movement of players.

“We’ve already done that,” Gardner said of the first two projects. “The OHF took bodychecking out of house league and select teams for the upcoming year and last season we accepted a sport school’s hockey team for an exhibition series with our midget AAA teams.

Second in a series of stories this week on the GTHL as the league celebrates its 100th anniversary.

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